Coolest Treasure Chest Birthday Cake

There are no Veggie Tales party supplies in my region of Canada, so I had to make my own for my 4-year-old’s party. This included the Treasure Chest Birthday Cake.

I started the cake using 1 chocolate cake mix, 1 tub of chocolate icing and 1 tub of fudge icing. The mix was poured into 2 square baking pans. The layers were cooled, wrapped in plastic wrap and put in the fridge overnight to make them easier to frost the next day.

To assemble, I cut off the “bump” where the cake had risen when baking to make top layer flat (set these scraps aside to use later). I frosted the bottom layer (bump side up) on sides and top, alternating the fudge and chocolate frostings and swirling them together for shading. The second layer went on top, propped open with the cake scraps saved from earlier. The risen part of the bottom layer will help keep it propped open, too. The top was iced with the remaining frosting, and then a fork was dragged along to make a wood grain effect. I spooned silver and gold dragees into the frosting on the inside of the chest. Gold foil coins were added, and a keyhole was cut out of gold foil and stuck into the frosting.

To make this treasure chest into a Veggie Tales Pirate theme, I added the Pirates made from melting wafers. I printed out pictures of the Pirates from the computer, covered them with wax paper and then piped on the melted colored wafers using freezer bags with the corners snipped off (make only the smallest of holes). This worked well, but I forgot that the pictures would turn out as mirror images and the “P” on Pa Grape’s hat turned out backwards (he also got broken, so we didn’t use him).

I put more foil-covered candies around the cake, and my son loved it!